As Samsung Display, LG Display and Japan Display have shut down mostly 5G to 6G TFT-LCD lines to gradually expand AMOLED production capacity since the beginning of 2015, global shipments of small- to medium-size LCD panels will continue decreasing from 2.647 billion panels in 2017 to 2.189 billion units in 2021, equivalent to a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of -4.6% in the period, according to Digitimes Research.

Global shipments of handset-use TFT-LCD panels will continue shrinking from 2.095 billion units in 2017 to 1.630 billion units in 2021 at a CAGR of -6.1%, Digitimes Research indicated.

In contrast, global shipments of all handset-use display panels will increase from 2.55 billion units in 2017 to 2.76 billion units in 2021 at a CAGR of 2.0%, with the proportion for AMOLED panels to rise from 17.7% in 2017 to 40.9% in 2021.

Since China-based vendors' presence in the global smartphone market has been rising, China-based LCD panel makers' combined shipments of smartphone-use panels are on the rise and likely to surpass Taiwan-based fellow makers' in 2016 or 2017.